The Relationship Between Teachers' Perceived Contextual Support for the Development of Social and Emotional Competencies and Diversity Awareness and Teachers' Burnout in Slovenia: The Mediating Role of Emotional Self‐Efficacy

ABSTRACT The rise in reported emotional challenges, coupled with heightened stress and burnout among teachers in Europe, underscores the need to develop a conceptual framework for understanding underlying causes and providing effective well‐being support mechanisms for teachers. This study built upon Bronfenbrenner's ecological model, stressing the embeddedness of individual development in their context, namely the macro‐level context and policies supporting teachers' social and emotional competencies and diversity awareness. Considering policies not solely as fixed conditions but as essential supportive elements that influence teachers' well‐being, we used structural equation modelling to analyse teachers' perceived contextual support for their social, emotional, and diversity awareness competencies in Slovenia (operationalized as perceived support for social, emotional and diversity awareness competencies from [a] initial teacher education, [b] continuous professional development, [c] school policies and [d] national policies) for teachers' well‐being (operationalized as burnout). Then, we analysed the mediating role of emotional self‐efficacy in the relationship between perceived contextual support and teachers' well‐being. We used data from the Slovenian primary/lower secondary in‐service teachers' sample of the project HAND IN HAND: Empowering Teachers Across Europe to Deal with Social, Emotional, and Diversity‐Related Career Challenges ( N = 272; 253 women; 42.54 years old, 15.37 years of teaching experience). The analysis points to significant links starting with perceived contextual support, which leads to emotional self‐efficacy and ultimately to cognitive, emotional, and physical burnout. Teachers' contextual support for social–emotional competencies and diversity awareness is shown to be a critical factor in preventing burnout.